Michel Szulc Krzyzanowski is a pioneering photographer
who lives and works all around the world like a permanent pilgrim........This blog reported on his experiences, observations and sometimes his opinions........

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

A flirt with death

The objective was to travel from Los Angeles, USA to La Paz, Baja California, USA.And this pronto because someone was waiting in La Paz.

When La Paz was only 260 kilometres away, it was late afternoon already.Not too far anymore but too late to go another 3 hours.

Forced, the refuge of “El Campestre” was found.One of the favourite camping places.It is outside the town of Ciudad Constitucion and in an oasis.Not only is it far away from traffic noise but from the humble and rumble of the town as well.The major attraction though is a very large swimming pool.Locals come there to spend the day but have to leave at 18.00 hours.After that the immense pool is for anyone camping in the trailer park.

Before to go to “El Campestre” some food to cook was bought and a bottle of L.A. Cerro Cabernet Sauvignon from 2006.While working on the computer outside the Fuso Szulc making use of its WiFi system, a glass of the fermented grape juice was consumed.And strangely enough, some time later, it turned out the bottle was empty.Somehow the first glass had been followed by the next to create a chain leading to ultimate happiness.

Then it turned out that besides the empty bottle, the large swimming pool was also empty because all people had gone home.

The sun still shining the plan was made to go for a swim.Nobody around, the Speedo could be used and soon the warm water and the palm trees surrounded the very well tempered swimmer.

Floating in the pool feeling to be close to heaven a memory came to mind from Cadaques.Cadaques near Barcelona, Spain.A village next to the Mediterranean Sea and famous for the fact that the surrealistic painter Salvador Dali used to live there.And this photographer.

There was a large community of foreigners living in Cadaques.Most of them artists.Fascinating people and one couple was especially befriended.For privacy reasons let’s call them Henry and Mary.He was a fabulous sculptor and she an out of touch script writer.Henry was a fascinating and also most attractive man and at one point he started an affair with another woman living near them.Soon many in the village knew about this.But not his wife Mary.When she got suspicious, she asked Henry if he had an affair.And he would flatly deny it.But she knew.For a while she lived with it.But that nags.She turned to drinking.Her life became unhappy and complicated.Until one night Henry came home from one of his escapades and couldn’t find his wife Mary.She was missing.The next morning he went looking and eventually found her.In the large communal swimming pool not far from their house.She was dead.Drowned in the pool.

We never came to know if it was an accident or a suicide.We could determine though that she had been drinking before to get into the pool.

These memories came back while bathing in the large swimming pool of “El Campestre” in Ciudad Constitucion, Mexico.The finished bottle of wine made to feel what it was like to be Mary.What she had experienced before to die in her pool with her wine.

It is about reality.When sober, one knows there are two situations:

one is to be with the head above the water,

the second is to be with the head under the water.

This is rather important to keep in the awareness when in a swimming pool.It is OK to go under the water, but this only by realizing it should be as long as the lungs can take.However, under the influence of a substance like alcohol, this strict separation between above and under the water evaporates.Under the water becomes equal like being above the water and this is not a very correct assessment.

Alcohol helps to let things go.But there is no control mechanism when and where and how much this letting go happens.

It is simply not a good idea to get into a swimming pool when lightly drunk.Let alone when one is heavily sedated.Things start to mix that should be kept in their own place.

The dip in the pool was a flirt with death.Very exciting and revealing.

Henry eventually married the woman he was cheating his wife with.And Mary can be found on the cemetery of Cadaques, Spain.